The claim of high tiger density in Sundarbans, the celebrated home of the Royal Bengal tiger, is under scanner. First, Central observer Anant Singh Negi questioned the official count of 250-plus tigers in Sunderbans during his recent visit to review the ongoing census. Now, a software prepared by the Indian Statistical Institute (ISI), Kolkata, has analysed the 2004 census data to conclude that there were no more than 54-65 tigers left in these mangrove forests.

The West Bengal government commissioned the UNDP-sponsored project to ISI for developing a software to process census data. Created by Professor Debasis Sengupta, the software was put on trial with the 2004 census field data.

While the officials had counted 255 tigers from the 2004 data, the ISI software could not justify more than 54. The forest department saw red and pressured the ISI, stretching the number to 64. Still unhappy with the outcome, the forest officials have not made the report public.

Experts including the Project Tiger’s official observer Negi, had warned against claims of ‘‘unreasonably high’’ number of tigers in Sundarbans.

“There is not enough prey base to sustain so many tigers. Though there are frequent tiger signs, we can’t tell if these are different tigers or the same tiger moving far and wide for food. We must radio-collar a few tigers and ascertain how much area they cover,’’ said Negi.

While recent attempts at radio-collaring have failed, Sundarbans Field Director Pradeep Vyas defended the previous census: ‘‘The ISI software cannot give authentic results yet. Still at a developing stage, it has problems differentiating between pugmarks. Besides, we made only about 60 per cent of the data available for analysis.”

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